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by ancillary 167 days ago
Yeah, on the spectrum of ways to make money, running a sports betting site is pretty bad. It's zero-sum (unlike, say, founding a company and getting rich from shares that were initially worthless), doesn't really incentivize discovery of any truly valuable info (if you find out a player is injured an hour before everyone else ... ok?), and seems to disproportionately hit people who are already not doing very well.

Seeing the statistics about young American men's betting habits makes me feel old.
3 comments
ACCount37 167 days ago
The sum is negative, really.

If you take $1000 from a few gambling addicts? You spend your own time and effort doing that - while the negative impact of that loss on their livelihood is likely to be larger than positive impact of your gain on your livelihood.

It's why gambling is usually regulated so heavily. Some people must have thought that sports-flavored gambling is going to be different - or were financially incentivized to think so. Turns out it isn't.

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ChrisMarshallNY 167 days ago
> while the negative impact of that loss on their livelihood is likely to be larger than positive impact of your gain on your livelihood.

What's your point? /s Negative things happening to other people is "0," as long as you are getting something from it. In some cases, it may actually be "good," if you don't like the people suffering negative consequences.

This is not a trait that only applies to gambling. Almost every corporation on Earth takes the same attitude.

That's why unregulated capitalism is very bad.

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master_crab 167 days ago
Not parent but I think the point they’re making is that there is no productive value from gambling (regulated or not). Unlike, say, plane manufacturing which provides a positive good to society and also benefits from heavy regulation.
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ChrisMarshallNY 166 days ago
It was a joke. Sorry. I keep forgetting sarcasm doesn't translate.
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potato3732842 167 days ago
Zero sum is still a hell of a lot better than broken windows negative sum economic activity. A lot more stuff than you'd think falls into that category.

At least sports gambling is fairly "pure" in that regard.

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watwut 166 days ago
It is not zero sum. If it was zero sum middle man would earn nothing. It is strictly negative sum because it is profitable.
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